Young Parisians

I do like the VIA Rail Canada service.
The Union Station in Toronto and Central Station in Montreal  are spacious and clean, easy to navigate and full of lots of helpful staff. The trains have big seats and free wifi throughout. It's worth noting on some journeys you are required to check in your luggage, luckily we didn't as we were on a quieter, early train.
The five hour journey between the two cities flew by and before we knew it we were navigating the Montreal subway to the borough of Le Plateau-Mont-Royal to our airbnb apartment. We were round the corner from the Sherbrooke Metro station which made our base a very convenient 5 or 10 minutes to anywhere of interest in the city.

Boulevard St Lauren

The Vieux Ville Quarter and Vieux Port of Montreal are most people's first stop when they arrive in Montreal. They are very pleasant areas to stroll around and you can take in most of the main sites in this area in a leisurely half day. The Place d'Armes is the focus of the Old Town Quarter with the Notre-Dame Basilica of Montreal as it's centre piece. The whole area is very European in feel as you would expect given the huge French influence, and you can see why this holds such an appeal for tourists. But we would later discover the heart of Montreal didn't necessarily reside in these older parts of town.
The adjacent Golden Square Mile area sits at the foot of Mont Royal and segues from the University campus area and impressive older buildings (from the golden age of the mid 1800s - hence the name) into downtown which is a concentrated mecca of department stores, malls, bars, restaurants and hotels.
The nearby walk up to the Chalet du Mont-Royal at the top of Mont Royal is an absolute must for a fabulous view of the island of Montreal.

Montreal as seen from Mont Royal

An unexpected highlight of our trip to Montreal was our half-day spent cycling.
We hired bikes from @caroulemontreal and they provided us with a very useful map of the canals and cycle paths around the city with several route suggestions.
First stop heading west along the dedicated canal cycle path was Atwater Market, a fabulous indoor and outdoor food market. The perfect place to refuel with coffee and cake.
Next we hit the islands, which are easily accessible from several cyclist-friendly bridges..
On the Ile Notre Dame we cycled round the Montreal Formula 1 circuit, the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve in the Parc Jean-Drapeau. We're not F1 fans but this was great fun.
On the Ile Sainte-Helene the impressive Biosphere hosts an environmental museum from the 67 Expo, and in the car park of La Ronde (an amusement park also from the 67 Expo which was shut when we were there) is the Lighthouse Ile Sainte-Helene, under the Pont Jacques Cartier.
We cycled 18 miles in the 3 hours we had the bikes, and it was a lovely way to see the rest of Montreal that we hadn't already covered on foot.

Lighthouse Ile Sainte-Helene

Despite all the fabulous sights, we found the Plateau-Mont-Royal district to be where the real Montreal was at.
As you wander up Boulevard de St Lauren you are constantly distracted by huge, fabulous wall murals and street art. The place is full of boutique shops, cafes, bars and restaurants, all perfectly conducive for sitting out in the sunshine with a coffee or beer and watching the world go by.
The houses in this area are huge and full of character and adorn tree-lined streets. Some have apartments on several floors reached by super-steep staircases, including our airbnb, and you have to wonder how the locals navigate these in the Canadian winters!
It was best summed up by a visit to a neighbourhood vegetarian restaurant which, despite it being midweek was wonderful busy and had a fantastic atmosphere.
We spoke broken French, gorged on humus burgers, poutine and red wine and slowly melted in amongst the locals. We were very happy masquerading as honorary Montrealers.

Plateau-Mont-Royal